A Mask Is Donned
by MasterFirebender84
Summary: Every mask has a story, a tale of the person hidden behind it. While some of these tales are happy & cheerful, others are dramatic & horribly tragic. One mask in particular will determine the fate of one man, a man with a spiteful past...Amon


Geez, what is it with me and oneshots lately? XD Anyways, I got the idea for this story from **PandaLily22**, who told me of a theory she had heard of. You'll see what that theory is in just a moment, but I found it interesting enough to do a oneshot about it. I do not endorse this theory; however, I find it very interesting and perhaps even a tiny bit plausible. But then again, theories are theories. :P I really do hope that you enjoy it, and please review! :D

**DISCLAIMER**: I do not own Avatar: The Last Airbender. The show and its characters belong to Mike and Bryan, the brillant geniuses behind one of the greatest cartoon shows in the history of cartoons. Their work is legendary, and I salute them for it.

**A Mask is Donned**

_History is not always kind to its subjects_

As I stand in the heights of Republic City, I wonder to myself just how these commoners manage to do it. How do they manage to live alongside these monsters known as benders, humans that are capable of manipulating the four elements? Do they not feel the pain that dwells deep in my hardened heart for these perverted abominations of nature? Bending is a curse, a blight that must be eradicated by any means necessary.

Perhaps I should start in the beginning.

I was not always the man I am today. I was once known as Noma, the second child of Avatar Aang and his beloved wife Katara. I was once a young man with black hair like my father and tan skin with sapphire eyes like my mother. I had two siblings: Makima, the oldest of Aang and Katara's children and their only daughter, who possessed the ability to Waterbend, and Tenzin, the youngest child and second son, who could Airbend.

But there was something that set me apart from my siblings…

I was a nonbender.

I, a child of an Air Nomad Avatar and a Master Waterbender, could not bend either Air or Water.

I was the laughing stock of the entire world.

Our world is built upon placing benders above all others. That is why the Avatar, the most powerful being in the world, can control the four elements. That is why the entire culture of every nation are centered around this ancient art, this method of using one's inner energy to tamper with nature.

Even to this day it sickens me to my core.

How do the Spirits eternal decide who deserves the heavenly gift of bending and who does not?

It is my immovable belief that they wish to punish those they do not deem worthy of possessing bending powers.

But for what was I being punished? I had done nothing to deserve such a fate. I was nothing but a newborn infant, a precious and pure life brought into the world twenty years after the end of the dreaded Hundred Years' War.

Thirteen years after the end of The War, my parents settled down in the Southern Water Tribe, where my mother and her brother were born, after they got married. Three years later, the world rejoiced when Makima was born, and my parents loved her with all of their hearts from the first moment they laid eyes on her.

I suppose I should describe Makima to you; she had tan skin and dark brown hair just like her mother, but her eyes were silver, much like her father's gray ones.

Four years after that, I was born, and the world rejoiced once more. As I grew older, I noticed that my parents spent much of their time with Makima, helping her to improve her fledgling Waterbending.

And I despised every minute of it.

Why was I not worthy of their attention? It had been established from an early age that I did not have the gift of bending, and I knew that diminished my worth in my parents' eyes.

Even to this day, I remember when I would lock myself away in my room, taking out my childish frustrations on the pillows. When my mother came to talk to me about the issue, she would always give me that motherly smile and tell me that she and my father would always love me.

I had to restrain myself from spitting in her face every time.

When my father would also come to talk to me about the same thing, he would give some grand speech about how nonbenders were an important part of our world. He would tell me of the countless times he relied on the help of nonbenders in his greatest times of need, and he would give me the same tired drabble of how he and my mother would always love me for who I was.

I wanted to punch those accursed arrows off of his jolly face every single time.

I always wore some kind of mask on my face when I was child; the mask of the good child, the son who looked like he felt left out but knew that he was loved by wonderful parents, the mask of the supportive brother, the one who was always there for his siblings, and the mask of thankfulness, the look that let the world know that I praised the Spirits for what they had given me.

But these masks only concealed the pain that was eternally growing in my young heart.

When I was alone, my masks grew much more sinister; the mask of rage, the mask of anger, the mask of hatred and disgust, and the mask of jealousy.

I despised my nonbending relatives for having anything to do with benders. They came to view benders as their friends and even equals, and that just made my hatred grow ever darker in it malignance.

Then came the day, three years later, when Tenzin was born. I was now the middle child, a most uncomfortable and often overlooked position in a family.

What a fitting place for a nonbender to be placed in a family of benders.

Three years later, Tenzin showed that he had the ability to Airbend, a fact that my father rejoiced in when he saw Tenzin Airbending for the first time. Needless to say, Makima and my mother were just as estatic.

As for me, I wept in my bed after everyone went to sleep.

The Spirits continued to curse me with my siblings, tearing me apart from my parents. Mother took Makima under her wing for Waterbending training, while my father took it upon himself to train Tenzin to Airbend when he was old enough. My father was the last Airbender in the entire world, and he knew he had to pass on his traditions to Tenzin since he was the only Airbending child in the family.

Could I not have been trusted the culture of the Air Nomads? No, what am I saying? The Air Nomads were the worst of the four nations, for every single one of them were Airbenders. Unlike the Water Tribes, Earth Kingdom, and Fire Nation, where benders existed alongside nonbenders, the Air Nomads consisted of _all_ benders.

Thank the Spirits that the Fire Nation wiped out the Air Nomads during the passing of Sozin's Comet over one hundred years ago.

They deserved such a fate.

All benders deserve such a fate.

There was one thing I did come to appreciate as I grew up in my family; Makima. She was the only one who truly did sympathize with my pain, and we grew very close as a result. She was the only one who knew how I felt about benders, and she kept it a secret from our parents.

As much as I hated benders in general, I didn't hate Makima. While I might have been jealous when I was younger and she was first starting Waterbending, she helped me to see that there was nothing wrong with being a nonbender. She said that, if anything, it made me even more special than her.

When I asked her why she would say that, she cheerfully smiled and said, "Because while you might not be able to bend, you can thank the Spirits for bringing you into this world so that you can see people use their unique gift of bending. After a while, my Waterbending can seem pretty routine to me; but with you, everything I do is an entirely new experience for you. Freezing water into ice and melting it back to water may seem boring to me, but I can still see wonder and amazement shining in your eyes every time I do something with my element." She took hold of my hand then and softly said, "Can you promise me something, Noma?"

"What?" I had asked her, feeling myself lost to the loving depths of her silver eyes.

She drew me into a hug as she lovingly said, "Promise me that you won't let your jealousy of benders get out of control. As your big sister, I want nothing more than for you to be happy in our family. I love you so much that it hurts, and I know you love me just as much. I don't care if you're a nonbender; you're my brother and I love you because of that." She squeezed me closer to her as she whispered, "Please, Noma…please promise me that you'll do what I've said."

I gave her my word, and for many years I was truly happy. My relationship with my parents improved dramatically, and I formed an especially tight bond with Tenzin. For once in my life, I felt loved and I had to do nothing to earn that love. I had the most wonderful family in the world, and as I grew up I appreciated the life I was given.

One day, that happy life fell apart at the seams.

It was shortly after I turned seventeen, and I was at home with my mother and Makima. Father and Tenzin had been gone to the Southern Air Temple for special Airbending training, but I didn't mind. I heard the tell-tale roar of Appa in the sky, and I looked up to see our Bison flying towards the house. Father and Tenzin had returned home after nearly a year of being gone, and I was eager to see them.

That was until I saw what became of Tenzin.

Tenzin…had his arrows.

My father had trained Tenzin to the level of a Master Airbender, which required absolute commitment and dedication to the practice of the bending art.

All at once, I felt all of my hidden jealousy and anger resurface, now tripled in its magnitude. I was furious; Father had left me so that he could give Tenzin the opportunity to earn his arrows.

In that moment, my father was dead to me. My relationship with both Tenzin and my mother fell apart from my raging grief and burning anger, and Makima was unable to find a way to help me. I lost all control, shoving aside any attempted contact by my family. My heart was crushed beyond all repair…

And it was all thanks to my father.

Three nights later, I ran away from home…

And I never looked back.

I traveled to Republic City, which had been founded after my father discovered a lost herd of Sky Bison and a colony of Ring-Tailed Lemurs on a small island off the coast of the Earth Kingdom. I was only six when the city was first founded, and by the time it was completed I was fourteen.

As I looked upon the skyline of Republic City, I humorlessly smirked to myself as I thought of how ironic it was that this was a city of the four nations, a city where benders and nonbenders could peacefully coexist.

For years, I hid away in the city, sticking to the shadows and avoiding the commoners at all costs. Year after year, day after day, my family sent out pleas to every nation and city in the world, begging them to help find me and bring me home.

My smoldering anger and inner darkness continued to grow in that time, and I grew more spiteful as the years dragged on. My hatred for benders consumed my entire being, and I placed a silent curse on every single one of those vile beings as I saw them walking along the sidewalks.

While in Republic City, I came upon a wise old man who was proficient in the ancient art of chi blocking, a technique that only nonbenders could use. He told me tales of one of the greatest chi blockers in the world, a Fire Nation Royal by the name of Ty Lee. He taught me everything he knew, and as I grew stronger I plotted my revenge against all of bending kind.

Seventeen years after I ran away from home, I got my chance.

The Avatar was visiting Republic City, and he was vulnerable.

As I dressed myself in my stealth robes, I knew that I was about to commit a heinous act. I was about to do the unthinkable, something that almost no one would ever _dare_ to dream of doing…

I was going to murder the Avatar in his sleep.

I held a mask in my hands, a gift from my chi blocking master shortly before he passed on. It was a contoured white mask with a red circle in the middle of the forehead, and black slits for eyes. My master had told me that this was the Mask of the Hidden, who was a Spirit that never revealed his face, choosing to commit his actions under the cover of a mask.

As I donned my mask, I ceased to be Noma, son of Avatar Aang and Master Katara…

I became Amon, the Equalizer.

I snuck into the Avatar's place of residence, using the stealth skills I had acquired over my many years of absence. I stood at the edge of the bed, looking down upon the man I once called my father. Time had not been kind to him, and his face showed for it. He had an immense weight upon his brow, causing wrinkles to form on his face. He had a small, wispy gray beard, and his arrows were as prominent as ever.

I took my stance, knowing exactly which pressure points to strike. I swiftly hit the points on his arms and legs, deadening them by the time he awakened. He looked up at me as he struggled to move and asked, "What is the meaning of this? Who are you?"

I recoiled my hand to my side as I said, "Hello, Father." His eyes widened in surprise as I struck his chest, collapsing his heart and killing him instantly. I watched the spark of life leave his stormy gray eyes, which closed for the last time in his life.

To anyone else, it would seem that the Avatar died in his sleep of heart failure.

But only I knew how he _really_ died.

After the Avatar's death, I secretly rallied disgruntled nonbenders to my cause. I trained them in the art of chi blocking and formed the Equalists, and we have brought our justice upon this city for the last sixteen years. We fight benders whenever and wherever we can, but mostly in secret as to not attract too much attention to ourselves.

I looked down below, noticing a newcomer to Republic City. It was a teenage Water Tribe girl riding upon a Polar Bear-Dog, and she seemed to be looking around for something. Even from my lofty perch, I could see a distinct light in her eyes…

The Avatar.

I darkly smiled to myself behind my mask.

_Hello, Father._


End file.
